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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28983828">And The Acrobat Sleeps</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/SwordSoup/pseuds/SwordSoup'>SwordSoup</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Stranger Things (TV 2016)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Billy Hargrove Redemption, Brotherly Steve Harrington &amp; Dustin Henderson, Experiment!Steve Harrington, Family Dynamics, Hawkins National Laboratory, Human Experimentation, Hurt Eleven | Jane Hopper, Hurt Kali Prasad, Hurt Steve Harrington, Hurt/Comfort, Memory Loss, Post-Stranger Things 3, Protective Billy Hargrove, Protective Steve Harrington, Robin Buckley &amp; Steve Harrington Friendship, Steve Harrington Has Powers, Steve Harrington Needs a Hug, Steve Harrington is Seven, Steve Harrington-centric, The Upside Down, inspired by mitski</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 09:13:44</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>12,194</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28983828</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/SwordSoup/pseuds/SwordSoup</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Seven can read what most can not. He can see how people see, how they feel, find what is within them, and twist it to suit his needs. Seven is exceedingly powerful, and cannot be allowed to escape. At the same time, Steve Harrington, kidnapped for ransom only weeks prior, has just been found, a nameless amnesiac on a bus to Hawkins, Indiana, a strange scar over his wrist and a shaved head.</p><p>It only takes Russian drugs for him to wake up.</p><p>(A story where a boy escapes from a lab and forgets his life. A story where he grows up in a life that is not his and that does not suit him and that he does not remember. A story where one day, fighting monsters both inhuman and not, Seven wakes up and finds that he knows nothing at all.)</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington, Eleven | Jane Hopper &amp; Steve Harrington, Eleven | Jane Hopper/Mike Wheeler, Jonathan Byers/Nancy Wheeler, Joyce Byers &amp; Steve Harrington, Joyce Byers/Jim "Chief" Hopper, Maxine "Max" Mayfield/Lucas Sinclair, Robin Buckley &amp; Steve Harrington, Steve Harrington &amp; Dustin Henderson, Steve Harrington &amp; Everyone, Steve Harrington &amp; Jim "Chief" Hopper, Steve Harrington &amp; Maxine "Max" Mayfield, Steve Harrington &amp; Mike Wheeler, Steve Harrington &amp; The Party, Will Byers &amp; Steve Harrington</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>44</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>224</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Old Skin</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hello! Wow! it has been a long time since I've written for this fandom. So long in fact that I would be VERY surprised to see anyone who recognizes my account and I. (Mostly because I orphaned the first story I wrote for this fandom. Whoops.) Regardless, I know this trope of "Steve comes from the lab" has been done.... quite a few times. I can promise that this version will be very different. I understand that this fandom isn't particularly active right now, but I do hope anyone who finds this fic enjoys it.</p><p>As anyone who has ever read from me knows, I do not have an editor/beta. I do all of this myself. I also happen to be extremely busy with my incoming school/workload. So, please, if you see any small mistakes, know that I'm trying my best! :)</p><p>Catch me on tumblr at https://www.tumblr.com/blog/soupsword if you want to chat, send me anything, or just see what I'm up to. Bye!</p><p>REALLY QUICKLY: Extra warnings will be added to each chapter in the opening notes. Please read them.</p><p>Warnings for this chapter:<br/>Nongraphic, brief suicide of a side character at the end.<br/>Descriptions of/adjacent to derealization, depersonalization, dissociation, etc.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>It’s described as a bridge.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A black place. Dark, deep, endlessly black. A void of light and feeling. Something completely empty save for the water on its floor. The description is given with clipped monosyllabic introduction, fed through a VHS tape with a short, pudgy woman shuffling papers and reading from a card. A place where one theoretically — though said in a way that suggested it was no more theoretical than gravity — could walk between places. Not other worlds, though. They’d been deliberate as to not imply that </span>
  <em>
    <span>other places</span>
  </em>
  <span> included worlds beyond the default. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was where someone could hear, see, survey who they pleased to. Foreign states. Enemies of the country. Anyone outside of oneself could be found and watched if one had the right capabilities.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven knew he’d only been told to view this tape because someone else had found the bridge. As far as he knew, he’d been the first. Pushing and pulling at the feeling of what the place could become, stretching his own consciousness until inky blackness swallowed him and he walked through nowhere. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But now, four years after the incident and the separation of his siblings, he has no idea who might’ve found it next. One and Four had taken their leave during the first escape. Two and Five had been killed, for all that he’d been told. Eight had run off during the final escape, leaving Seven behind without a clue as to how many more of his family remained. He was alone, and so the bridge had been </span>
  <em>
    <span>his </span>
  </em>
  <span>and his discovery </span>
  <em>
    <span>alone.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Until it wasn’t.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The man with white hair walks toward him in his room with a blank expression. This man called Papa is demure and reserved at the best of times, and he is angry, and he is silent, at the worst. Seven looks up at him and stares for a moment of curiosity, then tucks his hands into his lap, fidgeting with a stray piece of fabric.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is the description you provided to us upon your first vision,” says Papa, his hands folded behind his back. He sighs and leans forward, making a noise that implies it takes great effort for him to sit as he fits his thin, long legs into the metal children’s chair beneath him. “An abridged view.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven nods. He hadn’t lied about his findings, no matter what One had once urged him. She’d always put more value in morality, having not been grown and bred in a place like the lab. She’d always called him </span>
  <em>
    <span>test-tube baby </span>
  </em>
  <span>when they’d been alone. Older, faster, witty in a way Papa hadn’t seen coming. She had been rebellious. Like Eight. Like Two, and like Five, who were dead because of their similar nature. Her rebellious personality had been something Seven had admired. It had gotten his other siblings killed. He had not lied. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Now, Seven. I don’t mean to accuse you of anything,” he continues gently, his clinical smell leaching out. Seven knows not to push against his Papa’s mind, but he can’t help the urge to lean forward mentally, feeling the struggling grip of irritation and anger in the elder man’s chest. It flickers and burns, like the lamp Seven had once been given, going dark when his powers had shot the fuse. Seven quickly moves back, blinking rapidly as he cages his eyes. He will not be caught, and he will not lie, and Papa will be unaware of anything he might know. “But one of your siblings has finally found the bridge.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s not a surprise, but Seven jolts regardless. Quickly, he tries to recall those left in the lab and looks up with an inquisitive gaze. No one has </span>
  <em>
    <span>ever </span>
  </em>
  <span>found the bridge. Not that he knows anyone past eight — any numbers further have either been terminated or hidden, and Seven knows not to dig — but there would have been some mention before if someone else had found it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And…” Papa folds his hands against the metal of the table, looking deeply at Seven. His eyes are empty, black. They’re not the void, but Seven doesn’t want to look further. “They’ve reported a presence. Something more.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I haven’t seen,” Seven replies truthfully. There has never been anything else besides the feeling of the void and the people whose feelings came to him. </span>
  <em>
    <span>No one </span>
  </em>
  <span>else. In fact: unless he tuned his senses properly, there would be nothing there at all besides him and the water at the soles of his feet. “It’s empty.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Except for when you find people for us?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven nods. “Do I find people?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Papa lets out a soft chuckle and shakes his head. “Not today, Seven. Your </span>
  <em>
    <span>brother</span>
  </em>
  <span> is searching again.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He tries to not let the disappointment hurt him. None of his brothers that Seven had met had ever had the potential to find the bridge. Not yet, not when Seven last saw them. So, he isn’t sure of who this newcomer is. He’s not meant to worry about his siblings, but he always likes hearing news about those he was closest with.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But Seven.” Black eyes flash steely. Papa leans in and grips the table’s edge. His look grows darker, and Seven tries not to search. “Have you lied?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>—-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven hasn’t learned anything else about whoever found the bridge. He knows he’s not meant to get any information about outsiders, but one of the researchers lets slip that his brother, the one who had found the void, had over-exerted himself to fatal consequences. A seizure that had killed him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven doesn’t like to think about that.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Papa hasn’t visited him in three months. Seven hasn’t heard word of his brother in two. He hasn’t seen his other siblings in four years, and he hasn’t tried to find them since a month after someone had found out he was trying, and he’d been sent to isolation for far longer than he likes to remember.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How are we today, Seven?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He whips around, hands dropping the fluffy yellow fabric of the sunshine stuffed toy he’d been given for good work a year prior. It’s a bit stained, dark with unwashed brown, but he still enjoys it just the same. The cold, clinical metal of the room bounces across the white of the nurse’s clipboard, bright and jading enough that he flinches.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good,” he responds because anything otherwise proves dangerous. He gives her a little smile. This nurse is </span>
  <em>
    <span>new. </span>
  </em>
  <span>In the beginning, before they’d learned more about Seven and his powers, he used to have fun with the new ones. They were easier to read. Kinder, sometimes. He didn’t like manipulating them, but it came in handy when it did. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She nods, her shiny blond hair flashing copper. He can feel that she’s had medication administered already. There isn’t anything there besides cool, simple happiness, in her mind, and a blankness of thoughts. But maybe if he’s lucky, her tolerance won’t be too high, and he can feel </span>
  <em>
    <span>something</span>
  </em>
  <span>. “I have your medicine for today, Seven. Would you like it?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The needle she lifts is almost seven inches long. It’s thick, and it’s surely cold. Still, he has enough experience to know not to refuse it, and he nods.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Your Papa says hello, sweetheart.” Her gloved hands smell like antiseptic wipes as she grips his arm. Her glove is slimy and cold in a way that is </span>
  <em>
    <span>anything </span>
  </em>
  <span>but physical. Her smile, when inspected closer, is a grimace. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Good, Seven </span>
  </em>
  <span>thinks, realizing that she’s unaccustomed to the serum and that he has a chance. He lets the needle slide into his arm in a show of compliance.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The bite of the metal is painful, but the feeling of cold that comes afterward is much worse. He sighs and flexes his fist as dissociation comes in as cleanly as it can, his body floating upward as Seven floats back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>—-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How are we today, Seven?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The nurses come in shifts. It isn’t always a nurse. Sometimes it’s Papa. Sometimes it’s a doctor, quite a bit harsher than the (typically drugged to hell) women that tend to his medication and food. Papa is the one he thinks he’s least lucky when he sees. Even though the Doctors are cruel, Papa’s appearance always means something has gone </span>
  <em>
    <span>wrong. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good,” says Seven, to the same new nurse he’d had one week ago. He smiles at her, hesitant as he can be. He’s aware of how to create bridges already, and emotional ones are the kind he’s best at, whether they’re fake or not. She passes him over with the same twitch-of-the-lips smile and hands him a tray of food. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I have your medicine for today, Seven. Would you like it?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her eyes, upon closer inspection, are brown. Her roots are grown out with black, a sloppy dye job that she will probably never change again. When he leans into his reading, just the slightest, he can sense that behind the warm sleep of her drugged mind, there’s a fight. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He hasn’t wanted to escape for years. The last time he tried had been with Eight, and that had led to her disappearance and Seven being separated from all of his other siblings. But, with this woman and her sympathies, perhaps he can try. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Can I?” He tips his head toward the metal tray on the ground. Boiled carrots and peas. An unseasoned bowl of shredded chicken. As bland as possible. The under-stimulation makes him </span>
  <em>
    <span>hate </span>
  </em>
  <span>his home, but he’s thankful for the sunshine toy they’d given him a year prior. It sits abandoned on the floor, and he knows they’ll take it if he misbehaves. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The nurse smiles and shakes her head, her eyes a little misty. “Sorry, dear, but I need you to take your medicine first.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He frowns. The medication is </span>
  <em>
    <span>terrible. </span>
  </em>
  <span>It makes him feel as dark and empty as the bridge. Minus the wet, alive feeling it has — he’s left instead with a dull dryness as if his lungs are stuck together and his heart is collapsing without any blood to pump it. And even if he knows it might not end with anything good, Seven leans for her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her mind has the same, dry empty taste as the one in his chest after his medication. Her nagging worry is like a full headache, though he’s sure she can’t feel the pain. There’s nothing there for him to latch onto. Not yet. Nothing there to </span>
  <em>
    <span>grip, </span>
  </em>
  <span>to lengthen, carve and change into something else that he needs. That he needs her to need.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And so he leans back and lets the medicine flow through his veins.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>—-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The next time he sees the nurse, it’s a workday.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She hasn’t been there for one of those yet. Usually, when there’s a new hire, they’re not allowed to watch him work until they’ve gotten used to him. The last time someone new had watched, they’d tried to break him out. It wasn’t their fault — he’d definitely gripped what little emotion he could find, making her scared and guilty — but they hadn’t let anyone new help him since then. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How are we today, Seven?” She asks in the same exact voice as always. It’s nearly been two weeks, and he drops his toy in the same, routine movement as always. She’s not carrying any food or tray, but if he leans into her, just a bit, he can tell she’s been drugged with a much higher dosage than usual. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ready,” he responds. Her careful expression twitches at this, but he knows it won’t get him in trouble. On workdays, there is only one thing </span>
  <em>
    <span>to </span>
  </em>
  <span>be, and that’s prepared.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s good, dear. Are you ready to see your papa?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven nods at her, his fingers trailing for a moment over the sunshine behind him. It’s the first time since his last workday that he’s been able to </span>
  <em>
    <span>feel. </span>
  </em>
  <span>For the times between days, he’s watching in his own peripheral vision, his feelings like chunks of rotten meat to wade through rather than a stream of clear water. It’s dirty and viscous and </span>
  <em>
    <span>sluggish, </span>
  </em>
  <span>and Seven, for all he tries not to be manipulative or cruel like One had implied he could be, relishes in the feelings that swirl around him, his own, and others. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I am,” he replies quietly. The nurse’s lips twitch in understanding, and she smiles, gesturing for him to follow after her as she starts to walk from the room. She’s dressed in an all-white gown, wearing white, slip-on sandals, and she is </span>
  <em>
    <span>not </span>
  </em>
  <span>allowed to touch Seven. No one is. Getting close to him proves dangerous for both sides of the relationship. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven stands, eyes brighter than they have been for weeks, and walks to her. His feet are thin and veined-blue, his hands twitching, shaking mess of anticipation and anxiety. He steps without touching the cracks in the linoleum, delicately drifting his way to the great, iron door in his room, and out. The hallway is just as cold and clinical as the doctors that walk it, each of them wearing identical white lab coats and uniform-issued black oxfords. Their eyes are steeled toward their destinations, and Seven knows that he is the only test subject in the building, because every single one of them is </span>
  <em>
    <span>drugged. </span>
  </em>
  <span>The nurse takes a careful hold of his shoulder and starts to steer him away, her nails digging divots into the soft, untouched skin of his arm. His gown is ill-fitting plastic-fabric, and it slopes over one shoulder and falls down his arm. They’d expected him to be bigger than he is now, for his age, and they’d clearly counted it wrong. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>More proof of the lab's single inhabitant is the doors. In his one, singular hallway, there are only four, and he has entered them all. A decontamination room. His own room. An experimentation room. And, the worst of them, a sensory deprivation room. White walls and white floors and white-white-white, as endless as the bridge but the complete opposite. The room he walks toward now is the experimentation one. There’s no need for punishment, decontamination, or containment now, on his workday, unless he misbehaves. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>That’s the worst part of his plan. For it to work, he can’t have one.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He can’t think of a plan or an idea. He can’t think at </span>
  <em>
    <span>all, </span>
  </em>
  <span>for his mind might betray his thoughts, and he might be found and punished. The wires attached to his temples at all times, his hair shaved — hair he doesn’t even know the color of, for he’s not even allowed the dignity of a mirror — make him acutely aware of that. One brainwave out of time, and he is </span>
  <em>
    <span>done.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>So he doesn’t think about what he might be thinking, as the nurse leads him to the final room in the row of doors. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(One and Three and Eight, who liked her name because it was sharp, like a </span>
  <em>
    <span>K </span>
  </em>
  <span>and a </span>
  <em>
    <span>T </span>
  </em>
  <span>and the whistle of a </span>
  <em>
    <span>Z, </span>
  </em>
  <span>said he had brown hair. Like Eleven, who was barely three, with long brown hair, that would be shaved soon.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hello, Seven,” says the oldest doctor at the facility, standing in front of the locked doors. Dr. Caulder, as he’d introduced himself nearly a decade ago, with a handshake and an expression that suggested once upon a time, he was hopeful. With light brown skin, cold, orange eyes, and the same, calculating look as he has had for years. Seven has never been able to lean into him. He has never been able to see anything. He shivers when the doctor places a hand on his arm. “Today, we would like to develop your image of the </span>
  <em>
    <span>bridge.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>He shivers even harder at the feeling the name evokes in him. Bridge-days are never pleasant, especially now that his brother — unnamed, dead, never met — has found it. There are too many expectations for him, and Papa always pushes for </span>
  <em>
    <span>more, </span>
  </em>
  <span>no matter how much Seven’s nose bleeds or his head burns. Once, he’d vomited, all down his front and all down a nurse. He’d been put in isolation for two weeks and had been fed for three days out of fourteen. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ok.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The nurse prods him into the room with a hand to his back. It’s a large, completely metal box, it’s surface scraped and sanded over enough that no reflections can be seen. There’s a machine in the back of the room, along with a one-way window — darkened on his side, so he might not see anything but darkness. The machine whirs and clicks as Dr. Caulder straps his wires to it, transferred from a small, portable box to the large, bulkier machine, reading deeper than just the basics of his mind. He’s given no table or chair, but he knows where to stand. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The fifth scratch to the left of the door. He counts the larger cracks and categorizes them by feet. This one is two feet away. Four cracks ahead of it are five feet. He stands directly against it, feeling the cold, unyielding material against his toes and enjoying the sensation of </span>
  <em>
    <span>something. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Dr. Caulder and the nurse step out of the room a moment later. They shut the door without noise, and Seven is left in relative silence.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hello, Seven.” Papa’s voice is smooth and quiet over the loudspeaker. But, undrugged and fully aware, Seven has no trouble reading it. He’s calm and collected, and there’s odd desperation to his tone. Papa has never needed drugs — he’s always had an innate ability to hide from Seven when it </span>
  <em>
    <span>truly </span>
  </em>
  <span>matters. Right now, it seems, he’s been distracted. “Are you ready?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He nods. He is, if anything, curious about what he’s meant to read today. The loudspeaker flickers off at his confirmation, and the door opposite to him — not the entrance he’d come from, but a door to another, smaller room — opens, revealing a woman. She’s short and shivering, and her thin, white arms are clutching at her elbows. Her eyes are gaunt and frightened, and Seven resigns himself to his task. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven walks from his cracked tile to the next and stares up at the woman with an expression of disquiet. She looks down at him — them past him, at the wall behind him, like seeing anything but the cool, dull metal of the wall is agony. He knows the signs — she’s been dosed with something opposite to what the medical staff and Seven are given. It overstimulates those who take it, making every sensation, every emotion, stronger than a human brain cares to handle. Seven watches her with an expression he hopes conveys the sorry he wants to give her. He knows, from years of rooting about in people's feelings, that what he has to do, is </span>
  <em>
    <span>wrong.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Y- you’re s- s- so </span>
  <em>
    <span>young,” </span>
  </em>
  <span>she says quietly, still looking up at the wall. Her fingers twitch at the red of her elbows, dancing across like lengthy spiders. “You’re only a child.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her fear and her anxiety warps. Vision darting back to Seven, she frowns, her eyes going wide as she starts to realize that </span>
  <em>
    <span>he </span>
  </em>
  <span>is the origin of her suffering. Her breath comes up as a squeak, her lips opening to let out the barest of whistles. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The lights in the room flicker, and the woman leaps.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She lands on top of him with a scream of sudden anger. Her hair falls into his face as he lands on the ground, still expressionless, silent, as she starts to rip into his shoulders. She opens her mouth and makes to bite him, the only weapon she has left, her autonomy taken from her by a lab that has not hesitated to destroy her in their pursuit of knowledge. Seven does not blame her. He does not take any joy in his task, either. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He leans within.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It isn’t the bridge. The bridge is a between-place, black and patient. What he finds within her is more of a pausing place, where he lies and seeks out the wires he knows to pull and the buttons he knows to press. She shrieks as her anger becomes known to him, his hand coming up and the lights flickering off as he pulls her rage with a jagged fist. Howling and snarling, she tears at his skin and screams for release, the two of them rolling about the ground as Seven continues to tear. He grips at her hurt, her pain, at the hot and sharp red of her frantic, violent anxiety, at the deep yellow of her curdling disgust. It becomes known to her that she is about to die, and Seven pulls what is left of her out with a soft exhale.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When the lights turn back on, she stares at him, empty tears rolling down her empty face, and Seven begins to cry. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They don’t make him find the bridge, and he returns to his room without food. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>—-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The next time he sees the nurse, her eyes have begun to grey.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He doesn’t have much time left. The medicine leaves people quiet. It breaks people slowly, in a way that he doesn’t, in a way that is entirely like a cancer in the way it marches about. When he leans forward, searching her, he finds that there is very little left to spin. So, Seven is </span>
  <em>
    <span>running out of time. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“How are we today, Seven?” She asks, the same tone as always, the same quirk of the eyes and twitch of the lips, her hands fidget with the sides of his food tray, quickly silenced in a moment's focus. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good,” he says sullenly, dropping the sunshine. He’s only lucky that today isn’t a workday. He’s tired of being used as a disposal system. He’s tired of killing people, in a way that removes their soul rather than stops their pulse. He accepts his tray of food without a look in her direction, and starts to eat before she can ask:</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I have your medicine for today, Seven. Would you like it?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He continues to eat. Seven is </span>
  <em>
    <span>tired, </span>
  </em>
  <span>and he’d like to have something he can control, for a single time. The sunshine is glaringly bright, his headache worsening with the yellow, with the orange-grey-green of the mushy vegetables on his plate, with the purple-red bruise shade of the soggy meat beside it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Seven,” says the woman. He can feel, rather than see, her smile falter. “I would like for you to take your medication today.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven has been killing these people since they found out he was able to. He’s been bridging, building, breaking, and reading even longer. The emotion-death is newer, cruel, and exhausting. It leaves him feeling drained and filled all at once, exhausted, but encompassed, swallowed by the emotions that he’d been driven to rip out and consume. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>A loudspeaker clips on above him. The voice is monotone. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Comply.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The nurse flinches. Seven continues on, plucking up a piece of stray chicken with his fingers. It’s slimy and unpleasant, and he shoves it into his mouth like it’s fine dining. The needle in the woman’s shaking hands is long, and it will shatter if she drops it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Comply,” repeats the person over the speaker. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven breaks. He throws the bowl on the ground, scattering the food, and holds out his arm. The nurse jerks back, moves forward, and administers the liquid nothing to his bloodstream.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>—-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The nurse is gone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She hasn’t been replaced. She hasn’t changed much. She hasn’t left, or been fired, or been moved to another post, and there isn’t anything to indicate she will be his next target. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She has, simply and efficiently, succumbed to her medication. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The dullness of it all grows on people. Seven has seen it happen with every staff member he’s ever met, save for Papa. They come with shaking hands and twitching lips, and they leave without a wonder of what might happen to them. They leave, their emotions broken from them like a horse with its spirit. So, the next time the pretty blonde woman with a distinct clench of her teeth comes to Seven’s room, he knows that she has been lost, and Seven is too late. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How are we doing today, Seven?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He doesn’t respond. He knows it’s dangerous. </span>
  <em>
    <span>They </span>
  </em>
  <span>don’t like it when he deviates. Monotony and regularity are meant to be his day-by-day routine. Today, her expression doesn’t even indicate she heard him. He holds his sunshine and ignores her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I have your medicine for today, Seven. Would you like it?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s been around two weeks since he’s heard the same voice. The same inflection, tone, and subtle change to pronunciation. Seven doesn’t find any joy in listening any longer. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t give any indication that she hears him. She only smiles, standing there, a false expression, as the loudspeaker announces its presence with a loud crackle. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Comply.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven looks up at where he knows the camera in his room is. It’s stable and slow, silently watching him without movement. He looks away, and fiddles with his sunshine. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s bright. It has orange tassels coming off of each lumpy and misshapen rays of sun. At the end of each tassel is a yellow butterfly, metallic, tinkling together when he moves it fast enough. The face of the sun has a large smile on it. He likes to think it’s a genuine one, because it doesn’t bare its teeth like an animal or grimace when the expressions holds for too long. He knows, if he continues to be insolent, it will be taken away. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Comply,” repeats the voice, somehow dark despite its lack of feeling. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Comply,” it says for the third time. “Comply,” repeats, metallic, robotic, cold. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The door to his room opens, Seven ignores the sound of quiet discussion and spins his sunshine around, looking at the frown it makes when it’s smile is flipped. Someone says something to him, and the loudspeaker goes silent. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Comply, Seven,” says a voice, nondescript and faceless.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Someone grabs his arm. Seven loses his grip on his sunshine, and an Oxford clad shoe kicks it out of his view. The arm pulls him up, his shoulder burning and a noise of pain falling out of him before he can act. He clenches his eyes shut and struggles, yanking his eyes away blindly, hoping that maybe, if he ignores it, the men will leave him, and the nurse will go, will </span>
  <em>
    <span>die, </span>
  </em>
  <span>and he will be killed as well. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>His wishes go unfulfilled. He’s wrenched off the ground with a great huffing of breath, wrestled up and away as his legs bounce against the ground. He doesn’t fight or push, but he does let out an angry shout as he’s thrown into his isolation room.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His eyes stay tightly clenched against the burning light, and Seven starts to scream.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>—-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There is no door.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’s not sure what they do to cover it. The entire room is blindingly white. Light comes from three sockets in the middle of the room, blindingly bright and so overpowering that Seven keeps his eyes shut for as long as he can when he’s trapped in this place. The door has no outline or opening, seemingly no exit to be found. Being there, even for as satisfying a rebellion as he can give them, is </span>
  <em>
    <span>agony.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The door only appears when they’ve had enough time to shuffle his nurse and work schedule. He’s not allowed to eat, feel, see or understand anything other than the low hum of the lights above him, piercingly bright. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He knows that when the door opens today, it’s not supposed to. He can’t count the days or hours, but he knows by how tired he gets and when he gets tired, that days have passed. Not nearly enough, though, to do what the lab needs done. So when the door opens, and Seven opens his eyes to Dr. Caulder’s golden eyes boring into him, he can only blink back in surprise.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Seven,” says the Doctor, with a quiet voice and a sigh that, while empty, is like music to his ears. The boy in question sits up from his position on the floor, wiping away sleep from his eyes. The hallway behind the Doctor is dark, the security lights the only left on. “Follow me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No one else is anywhere in the lab. Oddly enough, not even a security guard or a late-night studying Doctor is there. Seven trails about at the side of Dr. Caulder, his mind relishing in the feeling of the man’s hand on his arm. It’s a break from the understimulation he’s so used to, and the light brown of his skin is an interesting contrast from Seven’s pale white.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“There’s been a breach in security at another lab. They’ve had to transfer several guards from this facility to the other, leaving an opening for a breakout here.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dr. Caulder looks down at Seven. His eyes, for years, have been the most lightless, deadened things that Seven has seen. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ve been working here, and on you, for over a decade. I have been fed — and I have willingly taken — drugs, to keep myself hidden from your abilities. I think that your Dr. Brenner has forgotten to account for one thing. Human morality.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven looks down the hallway. The stairs at the end of it are ones he hasn’t gone down in a long time, but he still remembers that there are exactly 247 of them. The grout between the tiling is dark and stained with more than dirt. He has no idea what Dr. Caulder plans to do.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Now: not that I’ve been following a typical moral compass for a very long time. It’s a requirement of the sort of career I’ve found myself in. I </span>
  <em>
    <span>cannot </span>
  </em>
  <span>focus on what’s right or wrong. Especially because the definition of those ideas is…” Dr. Caulder chuckles darkly and starts down the stairs, turning once to look at Seven as they start to walk. “Well. It’s subjective, to say the least. Anyways.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The lights in the stairwell flicker as Seven tries to lean in and read what’s left of the Doctor. Confliction and quiet mingle and twitch. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m married, Seven. I believe you know what that means by now?” He looks at the boy for confirmation, copying his nod. “Right. I’ve been married since before I came to work here. I was in love, at one point, I believe. If… if my emotions ever truly were my own.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven nods at him carefully. The medication is not </span>
  <em>
    <span>enjoyable, </span>
  </em>
  <span>stripping you of everything you are. Sometimes, in the depths of the depersonalized feeling it brings, it’s easy to wonder if that’s all you’ve </span>
  <em>
    <span>ever </span>
  </em>
  <span>felt. If the medication is an awakening, and emotions are what’s truly </span>
  <em>
    <span>wrong</span>
  </em>
  <span> about you, suppressed like a gift from some terrible god. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But no matter,” Dr. Caulder continues, shaking his head. His fingers dig into Seven’s arms, and the boy flinches, but they stumble down the stairs together either way. “My wife is pregnant, and they want to take the child. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Dr. Brenner </span>
  </em>
  <span>wants the child. He believes it might have potential. He wants to </span>
  <em>
    <span>test it.</span>
  </em>
  <span>” The man grits his teeth together and pulls them through a doorway. Seven stays silent as the door slams behind them, another long, white-tiled doorway waiting before them. “I know, in my chest, that I’m meant to be excited for this baby. Worried about how I might develop as a parent. Scared, even, for my wife’s safety, particularly as she gives birth. I always did like children. Did you know that, Seven?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“...no.” He looks up at the Doctor and blinks back something scared, the look on the man’s face almost a sad one. It’s more emotional than Seven has ever seen him, and he suddenly realizes he doesn’t even want to push further and look. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When he continues, Dr. Caulder is even quieter than before.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“They’ve already died. I dosed my wife-“ he runs a thin hand across his face, suddenly shaking “-with something quick. She was dead before she laid down for the night, and the miscarriage will be swift. I feel no guilt… but I feel echoes of the feeling. And I mourn.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You mourn,” whispers Seven. He can feel the feeling. It starts to shiver out of Dr. Caulder in soft, pulsing waves, and he realizes that now, without the drugs, the Doctor might have been able to recover. To feel. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes,” responds the Doctor once again, nodding. He leads Seven into an office room. From the photo of Dr. Caulder and a woman, tall, with dark brown skin and hair done up in an elegant updo, Seven knows it’s the man’s. Her smile is large and bright, and Dr. Caulder, several years longer, is grinning in a way that Seven knows is genuine, and it makes his chest ache with the humanity of it. He pushes Seven toward the large, bulletproof glass pane, and instructs him to stand to the side. “And I know that the only way I’ll ever get back at the bastards who killed me is to kill them right back. And, how more effective than to get rid of their greatest asset?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dr. Caulder grins. He pulls out a pistol, points it at the window next to Seven, and shoots. Taking several steps back, he shoots again. Then again, and again, bullets very slowly cracking the surface, reflecting the moonlight outside. Seven doesn’t flinch. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“They’ll come and find us soon, Seven,” he says boredly, reloading the gun and shooting two more times. The glass shatters and explodes, flying everywhere in a concussive blast. “And by then, I will be dead, and you will be gone.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He crosses to the window and puts a hand to the edge of the broken glass. Wind whistles inward, and Seven watches, eyes sparkling with his first vision of starlight in years, as he plants a foot at the edge of the window and starts to climb out. “What do you say?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And, well. He’s not thinking very rationally at the moment, but the wind whips Dr. Caulder’s coat backward, and he’s wearing a bright blue sweater, and moonlight stains his arms. Seven has not been extended genuine kindness in years. For all that the man seems to believe he is incapable, Seven can feel that the olive branch he has been given, is a true one. He nods, and Dr. Caulder jumps.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Despite the second-floor plunge, Dr. Caulder seems pained as he plunges. He lets out a sharp, harsh noise of annoyance as his back cracks, then looks up at Seven. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Jump!” He calls, hands cupped around his mouth. “Security won’t be this relaxed for long!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven looks down at the man in the night. His hands start to bleed where they clutch the glass at his side, and he lets out a hiss, pulling away and stepping backward. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Crazy,” he whispers, taken by the wind before Dr. Caulder can hear it. “This is crazy.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He hits the ground in a roll. His body feels the ache immediately after he drops, his knees bent and stomach dropping. He’d never been one for heights, not even during training when the lab had thought he and his siblings could be used for fieldwork. They’d quickly abandoned that idea after realizing they worked </span>
  <em>
    <span>far </span>
  </em>
  <span>too well with each other, but Seven uses the information quickly, diving back into years of combat training. Dr. Caulder gives him a quick nod and presses a finger to his lips, a manic look in his eyes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven looks up at the moon, clouds obscuring the edges. Stars peak out if he stares for long enough. And, he feels hope. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I have a plan for you, Seven, but you’re going to need to trust me.” Dr. Caulder walks away, toward the treeline, filled with pine and oak, and Seven trails behind him like a lost dog. He feels the comparison is accurate — he hasn’t left the lab in years. His pale, veiny skin accounts for that, and his confusion, fear of the outside, does the very same. “It’s going to sound… odd.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Where?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m relocating you to a small town far away from here.” He looks back to Seven and frowns. “Do you know where this is?” When the boy shakes his head, the Doctor chuckles. “I suppose you wouldn’t. This is Red Wing, Minnesota. You’ll be placed in another town, not unlike it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They enter the trees and walk side by side, now, the lights above Seven and Dr. Caulder winked out by the leaves and wood. Pine needles and twigs crack as he steps further in, barefoot and clad only in a hospital gown. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You won’t remember any of your past, naturally, that is the best I can do for you.” Suddenly, frantic, Dr. Caulder whips around and places his hands on Seven’s shoulders. “And you must </span>
  <em>
    <span>never </span>
  </em>
  <span>remember. If you do, you will be </span>
  <em>
    <span>killed.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven, taken aback, can only nod. Dr. Caulder responds in turn, releases the boy, and starts walking once again. They stagger through the forest for what Seven measures as well over half an hour, his feet growing raw and bloodied, the world sending him into a migraine with its sudden color. Gone are white linoleum and scratched metal tiles. Gone are lab coats, identical oxfords, voices coiled with drugs. Their replacement is pleasant in the sort of way that makes his brain hurt — green, and brown, and whistling wind, and the promise of sunshine soon to emerge. By the time Dr. Caulder starts to slow, he can see city lights. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Take these.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven looks up. In Dr. Caulder’s palm, held out to him, are a pair of sunglasses. He’s suddenly reminded of his sunshine, lying abandoned in his room. As Dr. Caulder tucks the sunglasses over his ears, he can’t help but wish he could find the toy. Perhaps it’s a sort of guilt for leaving Papa and the lab. Maybe he’s worried that his new life will be </span>
  <em>
    <span>too much. </span>
  </em>
  <span>But, he accepts the glasses and vows instead to find new sunshine. No matter how long it takes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s going to be a very overwhelming first few months,” says the Doctor carefully. He crouches down, squatting, groaning when his knees pop. When Seven looks closer…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His pants are plaid. Black and brown and grey, striped up and down his shins, hips, thighs, and knees. Before he can stop himself, Seven feels his fingers start to trace the patterns. The soft chuckle the Doctor lets out startled him, the vibrations running through his limbs. And, though Seven startles back, he finds that Dr. Caulder allows him to continue.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It will be overwhelming. And </span>
  <em>
    <span>hard. </span>
  </em>
  <span>But I want you to know, Seven, that you will </span>
  <em>
    <span>live. </span>
  </em>
  <span>You will not remember, and you will not know what you have done or what was done to you, but you will live.” The man catches Seven’s hand in his own and pulls him closer. When he really looks, Seven can feel that Dr. Caulder is thinking of his child. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It would’ve been a boy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’ll get a chance, and you’ll be able to be normal. So please, I beg of you to </span>
  <em>
    <span>try.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven falters, but only for a moment, before he nods.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ok.” Dr. Caulder lets out a shaky exhale, releasing Seven’s hand, his own twitching badly. He looks down at his former patient as he stands, pressing a hand to the boy's back and leading him forward. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The bus stop they find is bright and foreign in a way that immediately has Seven thankful for his sunglasses. It’s empty of passengers and the lights flicker, mold crawling over the cracked seats and the sign displaying the typical arrival times. Dr. Caulder hurries forward just as the bus pulls into the station. Seven looks down and back — at the pavement, at the road, at the bloody footprints trailing on the oddly textured sidewalk behind him. He wipes his skin off against his gown and blinks up at the huge advertisement on the back of the bus as Dr. Caulder speaks to the man inside.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When he returns, the Doctor looks even shakier than before. His deep, brown skin is cherry-wine with a sick flush, sweat dripping down his bow and into his neatly trimmed mustache. Seven can feel the panic dripping off of him in waves, along with something he thinks might be withdrawal. He grips at his shoulders, leaning down, and as he grows closer, the younger boy, shivering in the cold, damp night, can see that he has begun to cry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Just one more shot,” whispers Dr. Caulder, pulling a thin, orange needle from his pocket. It shines in the light. Seven feels his hope shrink, but he stays, raising his arm, regardless. “Don’t look outside once you’re in.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It slides into his arm, and he squeezes his eyes shut against the pain. Something different than his usual medication fills his veins, and Seven gasps, feet stuttering backward, his arm stuck in place by the firm, almost painful grip of Dr. Caulder. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Would you hurry up?” Snaps the man at the wheel behind them. Seven can feel- something, coming from the man, though he’s having a hard time deciphering it. Before he can blink, though, Dr. Caulder pulls out a much larger needle. It looks like what they used to inject tracking chips into dogs during a specific training exercise, and Seven jerks his arm back, eyes darting between the wickedly sharp blade of the thing and the Doctor’s steady face.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is important, Seven,” he says quietly, as he slides the metal </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>beneath Seven’s skin, just against his tattoo, blood bubbling up immediately, a cry coming to his lips before he can stifle it. Dr. Caulder shushes him quietly, pressing a finger, </span>
  <em>
    <span>terrible </span>
  </em>
  <span>in its gentleness, to his lips, as they tremble. Seven can’t quite get rid of his headache, worsening like stars bursting behind his eyes, as something lumpy and painful jerks into his left arm and </span>
  <em>
    <span>settles</span>
  </em>
  <span> there. “This is </span>
  <em>
    <span>important.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven nods and Dr. Caulder tucks his needle away, and he walks into the bus.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The room spins fiercely as he watches Dr. Caulder slip a ticket into the man at the wheel’s large, red fingers. He clutches the back of a seat for support as his vision twists, kaleidoscope patterns on the chairs circling his eyes and breaking, in and out, like great, tumultuous waves. He tips and turns, sliding into a seat, glancing about, and realizing he is the only passenger. Dr. Caulder has left him. He thinks of the man’s message. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Don’t look outside once you’re in.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven turns his head, looking out of the window and into the night as the bus starts to move. The last thing he sees as his vision goes black is Dr. Caulder, just between the trees, sending his brains scattered against the foliage. </span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Ode to Memory</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm back! *dances jerkily* With another chapter!!</p><p>Lots of vague foreshadowing and hints for both the readers and Steve in this. Our boy's natural state is confusion at this point. Hope you enjoy!</p><p>Warnings for this chapter:<br/>Possibly some derealization/depersonalization adjacent content? I think that's about it.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>When Steve Harrington is twelve years old, he is kidnapped for ransom for a week. He’s taken to some bog-water town at the American border, a group of five men petitioning for his father’s money. After one of them gets too physical with the boy, they realize they’ve gone too far, and they release him on a bus going south. He is discovered four days later, wandering somewhere nowhere and half-dead from starvation and hypothermia. He is shaved, scarred, and skinny, and he does not respond when spoken to.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Retrograde amnesia. That’s what they call it. Steven James Harrington will be able to create new memories, but he will likely never remember the time before he had taken a large, unknown blow to the head. Through nearly an entire year of rehabilitation, he is put through extensive physical and speech therapy, relearning how to walk, speak, and function, as if he’d never really been someone at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He spends his years in relative peace. His parents are caring, though distant, acting as if he hasn't been their child until a few weeks prior every time he sees them. He has a slow cycle of nurses as he regains normal function, starting to live again as he learns to not flinch when lights are turned on or when the tv is too loud. He wears sunglasses as his family moves him and a maid to a small town in Indiana, letting him assimilate with the community and become someone he has </span>
  <em>
    <span>forgotten</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nice,” says his mother, when he asks her how he was before the accident. She sips from a flask and nods at him, a distant, calculating look to her. It makes Steve shiver. “Nice, and quiet, and strong. Like your father.” It looks like a plan, and a secret.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He manages to rejoin society within a few months of moving. Somewhat stilted, somewhat odd, he starts middle school, passing along classes with surprisingly good marks for someone with permanent brain damage. He lives like someone in a show, mimicking a persona he must have witnessed somewhere rather than someone he used to be and never would be again. The children he meets treat him normally -- something that, for some reason, gives him whiplash -- and he joins them in their lives.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve James Harrington, with retrograde amnesia and who can’t handle bright lights, is quiet, and odd. He has a lump of a scar on his left wrist, hard times with conversation, and his lucky number is Seven.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin snaps beneath his eyes, in front of his nose, his eyes crossing as they focus on her. He jerks back and grabs her fingers, frowning at her as she lets out a chuckle.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Let’s go, sleepyhead.” Plucking up a VHS tape, she spins around, walking over to an empty shelf and considering the labels on the wood. She squints, then finally selects the square dubbed “thrillers.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s no chance of him following along, no matter how much Robin has been trying to help him. Steve is completely </span>
  <em>
    <span>useless </span>
  </em>
  <span>when it comes to movies. They’ve never been his sort of thing -- in the same way that migraines and stomach aches aren't really anyone’s either. He grumbles at her regardless. “I’m </span>
  <em>
    <span>trying.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Evidently not hard enough.” She picks up a tape with a woman standing over a man, smoking a cigarette, passed out. Steve rolls his eyes and snatches it from her just as she starts giggling, filing it under the lowest shelf. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Adult films. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Despite popular belief, not his favorite media to consume. “Woah, look! You filed one right!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He gives her a dirty look. “It’s got a naked dude on the front. And it’s called Body heat. Yknow- I’m starting to think you think I’m stupid or something, Robin-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You haven’t proved me wrong yet-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s a- a little insulting, honestly! He tosses his hands in the air and nearly smashes a bowl of popcorn, wincing when the glass smacks his hand. “Ow- shit-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“See!” Robin shoots him an incredulous expression. “Peek douchebag zombie behavior, right here, Harrington.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Despite himself, Steve laughs. It’s a good day. Warm and soft like anything, sun staring down from above with only a few clouds to provide a bit of shade. People walk about like the world doesn’t exist, familiar, comfortable selfishness, letting everyone thrive individually. Steve works for a dog-shit boss and a dog-shit store in a dog-shit town, but he has people like Robin to make it bearable. He closes his eyes for a moment and relishes in the knowledge that he does not belong to a town like this, and he will not live in Hawkins forever.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Earth to dipshit.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He opens his eyes, looking up from his slouched position to see Robin regarding him with a fond expression. “You done napping?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Just about,” he responds, his eyes slipping back shut. “Hey- </span>
  <em>
    <span>ow!” </span>
  </em>
  <span>He shoots right back up as Robin kicks his side, grabbing her leg and glaring, hard. She devolves into giggles, hair flashing auburn in the sun, and freckles a gold he thinks he recognizes from the past. “What’s the hurry, anyway? Keith isn’t even here, Rob.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Uh- yeah. Now I see why you keep getting fired. That’s exactly the sort of attitude that gets assholes out of a job.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey now!” lurching up, he glares at her, taking a few stunted steps forward and pointing at her with an accusatory finger. “You- We both lost our last job! Because the mall had evil Russians and then it </span>
  <em>
    <span>exploded-”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin breaks off into even more uncontrollable giggles and presses a finger to his lips to silence him. He can’t help but grin against her hand, watching her bangles twitch as her wrist shakes. Sometimes, he wonders how he ended up with such good friends. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ok, ok, point taken. Let’s just get this done and then we can clock out, yeah?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At Steve’s nod, she removes her finger, walking back to the bucket of tapes and pulling another out. It reads </span>
  <em>
    <span>Exotic Porn; Cunnilingus and You. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Twenty minutes later, three more sex tapes, twenty-five horrors, and seven fantasy knock-offs that Steve thinks would make Dustin’s blood boil, their shift finally ends. The job is a little stressful if he’s being honest. Movies and their content had always been for passive viewing. He’d never been able to handle their bright lights or screaming, shouting, characters. Doctors had called it </span>
  <em>
    <span>trauma. </span>
  </em>
  <span>The kids at school had called it something a </span>
  <em>
    <span>little less nice.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin sweeps the back counter free of popcorn kernels. Steve categorizes the keys, sorting them into little holders labeled things like </span>
  <em>
    <span>backroom </span>
  </em>
  <span>and </span>
  <em>
    <span>basement. </span>
  </em>
  <span>He leaves one out, taking it with him as he slots it into the front door, locking it behind him. She’s dressed in a brown blazer and white t-shirt, mom-jeans tucked up above her ankles and neck jangling with chains. Steve’s wearing something he knows she finds boring, but the soft material of white cotton shirt is boring enough to work for him. She doesn’t comment -- just as long as it isn’t the Scoops Ahoy uniform, neither of them protests what the other chooses to embarrass themselves in.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So” She plants her hands on her hips. “Last night of freedom.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“For you,” Steve says, looking to the side and pointing at her. “I couldn’t even make it into community college.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin glares at him and rolls her eyes. “You are </span>
  <em>
    <span>not </span>
  </em>
  <span>stupid enough to fail at getting into community college. I’m pretty sure you forgot to get your admissions info soon enough.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, well. Either way, I’m not going to Brown, or Yale, or Harvard, or wherever else daddy-dearest had his heart set for me,” he drawls, counting each college out on his fingers and shrugging his backpack into the backseat of his car. It’s sweltering hot inside his car, even with the windows having been cracked all day, and he doesn’t hesitate to roll the rest down with a groan. “I’ll try again this year. Isn’t that a thing- like- like leap years?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yep,” Robin says, popping the P. “Start driving, Harrington, or your kids are gonna get antsy.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She sits next to him in the front seats. Robin’s hair whips behind her as she sticks her head out the window, whooping something unintelligible. Steve shouts in tandem, turning the music up and speeding past a stop sign the moment he can. And, in the warm summer heat, things are good. It smells like candles and cinnamon in his car, and there’s a pair of bright blue dice hanging from his mirror, both courtesy of Robin. He thinks, in a past life, they might’ve been friends before. There’s no other real explanation for whatever the hell their life has become. Steve laughs, and things feel right.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So,” Robin begins, breaking the night, not unkindly. “Late Fourth of July?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve snorts. It’s their plan for the night -- set off fireworks, drink shitty mocktails, try not to think of everyone they’ve buried, everyone they’ve lost. The kids and Nancy and Steve and Robin, minus a family and minus a chief. He glances back to the large bucket of fireworks in his backseat as the light flickers red, nodding.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I mean, none of us really got one, hm? I- i think we should be doing stupid teenager shit. Forget a little for a while.” He turns back to the steering wheel and murmurs, under his breath: “The kids need it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Harrington. Never knew you cared.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He chuckles, tossing his head back as he turns toward Dustin’s road. “It’s been known to happen. I can be competent, you know, Buckley? Don’t act like you haven’t seen it!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, yeah, what, as a </span>
  <em>
    <span>mom?” </span>
  </em>
  <span>She grins at him, and he makes to snap back, but he’s stopped by a knock on his window. On his </span>
  <em>
    <span>moving car.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“Jesus!” </span>
  </em>
  <span>He shouts, slamming on his breaks just before he runs over a curly-headed figure outside. Dustin grins at him like it’s all he can do to stop from screaming at him with elation, rushing over to the back seat and yanking the door open. “Holy shit, Henderson!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey, Steve, Robin,” Dustin says without care, shoving over the tub of fireworks and backpack in one fell swoop, replacing him with his ass like he hadn’t just almost been hit by the same car he’s sitting in. “How are you? Doing good, I presume? Right- good- yeah-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No! Nuh-uh, Henderson.” Steve presses his arm to the back of Robin’s seat and whips his head around, glaring at the boy in a way he hopes comes off as menacing. “What the hell was that? I spent too much time keeping you alive all summer to accidentally kill you </span>
  <em>
    <span>now.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not gonna lie, it would be sorta unfortunate if you died tonight,” Robin says. She seems to be quite a bit more blase than Steve. He pulls back and presses his foot to the gas with a groan of useless exasperation. “We’ve got </span>
  <em>
    <span>illegal </span>
  </em>
  <span>ones.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Guess that’s one plus to the chief not being here.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The car doesn’t go quiet, but the atmosphere changes the moment Dustin finishes his sentence. It’s only two weeks since the funeral. Since they’d buried a body they hadn’t had, and the kid had been forced to watch two of his closest friends and two of his biggest allies leave him behind in Hawkins. It’s a tangible thing, the sudden twitch to the mood, a deep burgundy rather than the orange-red-blue of a summer sunset that had pervaded the air only moments ago.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He’d want you to enjoy yourself.” Steve doesn’t look away from the road, but he feels Dustin’s stare at his back regardless. “He died protecting you all. Protecting us all. I think…” A smile creeps up his face, and he nods, sure. “Mm. I think he’d want us to set off something big in his memory.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They pick up the rest of the kids without any issues. Dustin seems to be the only one trying to get Steve into a car accident, which he sort of appreciates, and soon enough, Max and Lucas and Erica have all joined them. Mike and Nancy tail behind Steve like the decent-driving, smart, middle-class people they are, and he tries not to run any stoplights while Erica shouts at him to go faster and Dustin nearly throws his backpack out the window. It takes them half an hour to make it back to Weathertop and Cerebro, and Steve thanks a nonexistent God that no cops find it in their nature to chase after them when he speeds the process up a bit. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Erica and Suzie aren’t a part of the kid’s little Party. Steve was adopted into it sometime during the Russian invasion, Robin being on probation until Will and Eleven get to interact with her more, and Billy has been given an honorary title as Max’s plus-one after his funeral. But, despite their un-involvement, both of them are inextricably tied to the events of the summer. Suzie with her limited knowledge and her -- frankly brilliant -- mind, and Erica with whatever redeeming quality she cycles through when she’s not being rude.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Alright!” Snaps Steve, swerving to the side of the road so hard everyone -- save Robin, chewing a wad of gum and now holding the fireworks to make sure Erica doesn’t do anything funny -- screams. He counts the seconds before it stops. 13. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What the hell, man!” Lucas leans over and looks out the window. “Why’d you stop?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve claps his hands together, leaning back in his chair then turning to face the kids, pushing Lucas’s head back with a finger to his forehead. The boy sits down again and throws his hands up in exasperated disgust. “Ground rules, pipsqueaks. Ground rules. I know you all set off super-explosions back in Starcourt, but we are </span>
  <em>
    <span>not bombing the Mind Flatter tonight, ok!”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fl-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nope!” Dustin snaps his mouth shut at Steve’s admonishment. He knows the stupid monster’s name -- who cares if he just doesn’t want to say it? The amount of thought they put into naming the interdimensional beasts they’ve fought, while admirable, is ridiculous, and he refuses to become such a nerd that he refers to them as what Dustin wants.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You.” He looks at Erica. “Keep fireworks away from people’s faces. If you try to set one off without my help, I’ll kill you.” She blinks at him disinterestedly. Next: Lucas. “You. If you try combining fireworks again, I’ll </span>
  <em>
    <span>double </span>
  </em>
  <span>kill you.” The expression the boy gives him, while overexaggerated, is satisfying. Max looks at him expectantly, her arms crossed. He points at her, glaring, and falters. “Eh- you’re fine, Hargrove, you’re pretty smart.” (That one earns him a few undignified squawks from the other inhabitants of the car.) And, finally, with a glare so hard he hopes Dustin can </span>
  <em>
    <span>really </span>
  </em>
  <span>feel it: “If Suzan makes-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Suzie.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve blinks at him. </span>
  <em>
    <span>“Suzie. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Fine. If </span>
  <em>
    <span>Suzie </span>
  </em>
  <span>makes you sing from the Neverending Story again,” he continues, leaning in and packing as much </span>
  <em>
    <span>murder-murder-murder </span>
  </em>
  <span>as he can into his expression, </span>
  <em>
    <span>“Do it quietly!”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>They hike up the hill with quite a bit of elbow grease. Nancy and Mike fill them in on how their respective partners are doing. Max makes fun of Lucas having to be warned against making bombs, while Erica teases him for everything else. Dustin chatters Steve and Robin’s ears off, only pausing for breath when Cerebro comes in sight. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“My </span>
  <em>
    <span>baby!” </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Dustin goes sprinting past the group, running at his radio with an expression of pure elation so ridiculous on his face that Steve cringes back. He falls to his knees and immediately starts to fiddle with the dials, picking up the microphone and flipping his friends off when every single one of them groans and lets off matching vomiting noises. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fantastican! Fantastican, do you come in?” Dustin picks up the microphone and starts calling into it, ignoring the others as they either watch and roll their eyes, or, in Steve, Robin, and Nancy’s cases, start doing more productive things. “Fantastican, come in.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At the rest of the group’s confused looks at him, the boy throws his hands up. “What? We needed code names!”</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“Auryn?”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>His attention is immediately taken by the crackling name given over the microphone. Steve snorts and turns away, he and the rest of the eldest of the group starting to sort out the fireworks. None of them are nearly as extravagant as what the kids had fancied in Starcourt, sure, but as the sun starts to set and they light the first of the sprinklers, it seems like they prefer these.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He picks up something called a </span>
  <em>
    <span>blight bottle </span>
  </em>
  <span>and considers it, carefully spinning it around and reading the label. The wick at the bottom is long, and clearly made to give someone time to run away, and Steve grins as he reads the explosion radius measurement. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Erica, realizing that he’s the only one not currently chasing someone with a firecracker, walks over. She crosses her arms and wrinkles her nose in distaste but eyes his pick curiously. “Fireworks </span>
  <em>
    <span>smell bad,” </span>
  </em>
  <span>she moans, spreading her arm to point at the box. “Like </span>
  <em>
    <span>ozone </span>
  </em>
  <span>and shit.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s not very patriotic,” Steve says distractedly, tugging his lighter out of his back pocket. The </span>
  <em>
    <span>Blight Bottle </span>
  </em>
  <span>sparkles a glittery green as he stabs its base into the ground, preparing to surprise the group with the first </span>
  <em>
    <span>real </span>
  </em>
  <span>firework of the night. “Where’s your sense of excitement?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“At home,” she responds gloomily. Her sparkler — a pink, my little pony themed one, drops to the ground, discarded, and she reaches inside the cooler Nancy’d had the foresight to bring. She grabs a bag of chips and sighs, sniffing deeply into the artificial cheese scent of Cheetos. </span>
  <em>
    <span>“That’s better.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh yeah?” Steve, finally getting a good grip on the explosive, lights the end. “Back up.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They do a dance-shuffle backward, the girl giggling as he pulls her further away, the two of them both grinning wildly as the little plume of flame grows larger, larger, creeping farther up the dark wick, hidden against the cleared-out dirt square beneath their feet. Then:</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Boom.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>The gunshot is like nothing he’s ever heard. The man goes dropping to the ground, his lab coat, his oxfords stained black in the moonlight. The trees hide an unknown corpse as something starts to move beneath him, his body swaying back and forth as his mouth opens to shout, to speak, to do anything more than watch as his savior ends his own life- </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve twitches back to life.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He jerks back up from his doubled-over state, a hand going to his head as the sounds of excited shrieks flies back to life. Gone is the sound of a gunshot, of tires and metal and whispering wind and too-bright city lights, replaced with children running like headless chickens in an attempt to chase each other and the great, golden-green sparks of the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Blight Bottle </span>
  </em>
  <span>he’d only just set off. Erica looks up at him, her expression warping to one of confusion as he grimaces.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey. Hey, </span>
  <em>
    <span>Steve. </span>
  </em>
  <span>What’re you doing?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His </span>
  <em>
    <span>head hurts. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Gunshots echo through his memory, something long suppressed, so deeply that he feels like it must’ve torn through his muscle and skull for him to have seen it. There’s a phantom pain, bulky and uncomfortable, in his wrist. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The sound completely re-emerges. Steve is back on Weathertop, and noises of weaponry are only the sound of a late Fourth of July celebration. The sky is a purple bruise like none he’s ever seen, and he scratches at his left wrist, the lumpy scar beneath it, and the odd break that had never healed right, as he turns to Erica.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m fine. Just a headache.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>—-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve hasn’t had a neurologist </span>
  <em>
    <span>really </span>
  </em>
  <span>working with him since around two years after they first diagnosed him with amnesia. His parents, worried as they were, had him doing yearly visits far longer than necessary. Nowadays he’s sure that the Department of Energy would prefer he use </span>
  <em>
    <span>their </span>
  </em>
  <span>doctors when discussing his recent head injuries — particularly the more sensitive nature of how they occurred — but he can’t bring himself to care. Hawkins lab and their superiors have always chilled him in a way he can’t quite define, more so than just disgust for how they treated Eleven. So, one week into the beginning school year, he chalks it up to paranoia and calls his own, normal doctor.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And, of course, because several hits to the head and next to no medical treatment never bodes well for someone with a history of brain damage, he gets a referral to a neurologist. To add to that, because Steve’s life is hell, his appointment is during work hours.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No- no, </span>
  <em>
    <span>Keith-“</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“No!” The pimpled teenager slams a hand onto the counter, hiding a vindicated grin. “No, Harrington! If you miss that day then you are </span>
  <em>
    <span>out of here. </span>
  </em>
  <span>No exceptions.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh </span>
  <em>
    <span>come on </span>
  </em>
  <span>man,” Steve groans. He’s tried negotiating. He’s tried pulling out a doctor’s note. He’s tried pretty much </span>
  <em>
    <span>everything, </span>
  </em>
  <span>but Keith seems so stuck in the fact that Steve wasn’t a saint in high school to change his opinion. “Remember Starcourt getting blown up?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith eyes him warily, mouth opening to give some snarky remark. Steve throws a hand up to stop him and makes loopy signs at his head. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah. It- like- it blew up my head, too, and if I don’t get it checked out…” he trails off and groans. No one in Hawkins — and Steve means </span>
  <em>
    <span>no one, </span>
  </em>
  <span>not even Tommy, Carol, or Nancy — knows about his amnesia. He’s always been good at formulating stories, thinking up what his past might’ve been from the base emotions he can remember regarding it, loose feelings, and empty holes. He’d moved here after his kidnapping, and his father’s firm had preferred to keep the fact that they were being forced to pay ransom a </span>
  <em>
    <span>secret. </span>
  </em>
  <span>No media, no news, no anyone. “I’ve got a history with this shit, ok? It’s not pretty.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They stand there, a silent face-off at the desk, staring at each other. Steve’s hope grows.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, I've been wondering whether you were dropped as a child, Harrington.” Steve’s face falls, and Keith tosses him a VHS tape with a shit-eating grin. “Get. To. Work.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve looks at him with squinted eyes and a look he doesn’t need a mirror to see and know is enough to get him fired. Then, yanking the tape off the desk, he stalks away, filing it somewhere he knows is probably wrong. With his building headache, he can’t bring himself to care. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Later that night, he gets roped into some DnD plot with his kids on the </span>
  <em>
    <span>same day </span>
  </em>
  <span>he won’t be able to attend his neurological appointment. He calls whatever asshole his doctor referred him to, antsy, shifting about as he talks into the speaker.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah- yeah, I have to work that day,” he says, voice despairing. Dr. Green, a stern and solid-sounding woman whose voice puts Steve’s teeth on edge, sighs, and the sound of fabric rustling rolls over the phone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mr. Harrington, from what Dr. Fitzgerald has told me about your amnesia, the fact that you have faced several traumatic events and come out </span>
  <em>
    <span>regaining </span>
  </em>
  <span>memories is </span>
  <em>
    <span>not </span>
  </em>
  <span>a sign of health. It is imperative that you come in for an appointment sometime soon, even if it isn’t the 25th, or, even, with me.” She pauses. “I understand that many men prefer to have-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No!” he blurts, nearly shouting into the phone. He hates all doctors just about equally -- the older ones are a bit creepier, though -- but women being women has </span>
  <em>
    <span>never </span>
  </em>
  <span>been an issue. “No, it isn’t because of that, I promise. I just can’t get off of work that day.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A pregnant pause ensues. Static crackles behind the speaker. It feels familiar.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ok.” he can hear her starting to scribble something down. “I can try and open up a time for you on Saturday the 27th?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The calendar, when he looks into the kitchen, reads empty. A victorious thrill goes through him and he grins. </span>
  <em>
    <span>No work this saturday.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sure. That’d work.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>--- </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve wakes up a few days later under the bed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Not </span>
  <em>
    <span>literally. </span>
  </em>
  <span>It’s just the best way to describe the way the morning feels. Not on the wrong side. He doesn’t wake up grumpy, or overly-exhausted, or angry or particularly peeved with the day to come. There are no groans of annoyance as his coffee burns, or huffs of disgust when one of the bagels in the bag has gone moldy. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wakes up beneath the bed. Something has changed, so quietly and so inextricably, that he barely even notices. His mind is occupied with quiet, the space behind his eyes waiting for input outside of his own. He can’t quite feel the hot water under his hands, or the pang of worry he feels, sudden and abrupt, when he remembers how he forgot to pick up butter on his last shopping trip. It’s the little things. He leaves the house with hands that feel frozen with cold despite it only being the beginning of autumn. He presses his shoes into the floor of the car and sits, only for a moment, his vision feeling like it’s coming only from his periphery. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Shaking it off, he starts to drive. There are more important things than forgetting how to exist to do in the day. Namely -- shopping, because God-dammit, he will not cook without butter. Call him white-trash American, but toast is just </span>
  <em>
    <span>that </span>
  </em>
  <span>much blander without </span>
  <em>
    <span>something </span>
  </em>
  <span>on it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He pulls into the parking lot of the grocery store with a hum, realizing he never even turned the stereo on as he goes to turn it off. It’s funny -- he could’ve sworn he’d heard music. Or talking, or the after-effects of someone’s words. With a groan and a slamming of a door, Steve shuffles out of his car, taking in the nearly-empty parking lot boredly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well,” he says, suddenly dreading his trip for reasons he doesn’t know, “this should be fun.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There are only two or three people inside the store, best as he can estimate. They meander about and pick up boxes and set them back down, a mother’s child shrieking about cereal between her legs as she grabs something healthy up off the shelves. He curses his decision to go out at all when his persistent headache grows, digging into his temples so hard he has to take a breath before he takes a step. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve has never been the type of person to get overwhelmed. It’s what made him so good at basketball. He’s always been able to measure his own emotions and shift them about like building-blocks in his head, carefully controlling his reactions (when they weren’t downright panic.) Going and fighting interdimensional mold-dogs did </span>
  <em>
    <span>not </span>
  </em>
  <span>count. He was </span>
  <em>
    <span>not </span>
  </em>
  <span>going to chastise himself for being scared of them. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Or </span>
  </em>
  <span>the Russians.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He ignores the budding pain in the back of his skull and starts weaving through the store, quickly finding a shopping basket and grabbing the few necessities he’s missing. There’s butter -- and he’s hit with a sharp wave of something bitter as he passes an old woman, from where he isn’t sure. He finds the milk not far past that -- and something twists within him, foreign and not quite his, as he passes a short, sour-smelling man, his headache bursting. By the time he manages to get to the cashier, he feels halfway to a heart attack.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This it?” Asks the man, dressed in a green apron and with a shitty combover. He raises an eyebrow at Steve’s butter and milk. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh-” he nods, gesturing at the things and then planting one hand firmly on his hip. “Er- Sure. Sure, yeah, that’ll be it.” Steve curses his headache as he realizes he will most certainly have to come back in a few days. That is not </span>
  <em>
    <span>nearly </span>
  </em>
  <span>enough butter. Especially if he’s going to have the kids over and eating all his food. Steve stares at the man scanning his foods with a blank, wide-eyed expression, and suddenly finds himself-</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Resentful. Bored, too, of course, bored of monotony and resenting those who rely on him and angry at the world. Jaded to it, like it’s an annoying family member who has yet to move out of his house. Moss-green and blue like smog, smoke-colored and low-hanging, a cloud.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve jerks back from the feeling just as the man calls out his total. A gasp jerks itself out of his lips as he starts to breathe again. He searches through himself and finds nothing of the emotions he’d just felt, so quickly wrenched from his chest as he falls back into a quiet, empty, nothingness. And, perhaps, a bit of confusion.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“...Sir. That will be two dollars and twenty-eight cents.” The cashier squints at him. “Do I need to call someone?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh- right. Steve shakes his head and runs a hand through his hair, wallet already in hand. The man before him counts the money with an aimless shrug, passing back his change and his backs, before drolling off some repetitive and empty thank-you-for-purchasing spiel. Steve is more than happy to ignore him as he turns on his heel, legs itching to run, the fluorescent lights above them all flickering, only slightly. He runs through the automatic doors and his shoes squeak on the tarmac as he finds his car, tossing his food into the trunk and then collapsing in his seat.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He isn’t sure what spurred him on to run. He isn’t sure why he panicked, or what happened in that store. Steve’s headache is gone. He scratches aimlessly at his wrist. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When he looks up, Hawkins is gone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s something dark that has replaced it, black, water flickering below his ankles, settling at the bottom of his car. His eyes slide slowly across the landscape. His numbness stretches, as he watches, inky darkness stretching out like some sort of horrible, horrible memory. And, for some reason, he is not afraid. When Steve blinks, he thinks he might want to kill somebody with his bare hands.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He blinks again. Hawkins is back, and he is numb once again. </span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Not the most action-packed chapter ever, I know, I know. I'm going for a bit of build-up :)))) Things will be happening soon. Lots of things. </p><p>(Just wanna make it clear that this line: "When Steve blinks, he thinks he might want to kill somebody with his bare hands." is not actually STEVE'S feelings.)</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Whhhggggh........... So. How was it? Send me kudos and comments and strongly worded opinions or ANYTHING. One of my favorite parts of writing is knowing that people are enjoying what I've done. Or! Just be silently supportive. I accept it all, and I appreciate every single person who reads this.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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